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What`s your market research process?

A detailed account of a Fastlane process...

pisco

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Hello guys,

I am an extremely structured person. However, I have been much more on the product development site of things and really have no experience with market research/competitor analysis. Therefore I was wondering, how do you do that?

What`s your market research/competitor analysis process?

I appreciate your answer!
 
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pickeringmt

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Yeah buddy, this will vary a bit from product to product but it is pretty simple to get started.

When I start out, I just brainstorm a list of all of the relevant defining factors for my business and product, things like:
  • who is the target/ideal customer
  • how is their website
  • how is their SM, and what channels do they use
  • packaging
  • pricing
  • fulfillment
  • cart
  • reviews
  • voice (brand)
  • and a good ol' fashioned SWOT
This should be a good place to start. Put these in a spreadsheet, as columns. Then, search around your niche for 5-10 of your top competitors and build them in as rows.

Now just go through and fill it in. I am sure that you will come across more metrics that you will want to add columns for which will be niche specific.

This should get you started, good luck man!

BONUS: when you visit these sites, pay attention to ads you get from these brands after (via re-targeting). This will give you an idea of both:
A- what kinds of ads the competition is using
B- where they are using them
 

Mattie

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Observational field research, but that is easy for being a life coach. Not so easy for other business. Meet people where they are and observe, listen, take notes, ask questions, answer questions. I can tell you I've learned a lot that way. Paying attention to every detail.
 
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pisco

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google is my best friend :)

Thx for your answer! However, I do not believe in some marketing research posts by authors who do not have doneit, but write about it.

Hence, I would be interested in your own experience and YOUR process!

I appreciate your answer!
 

pisco

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@all Thx for your answer!

Do you create the product first or after the market research? So do you do it kind of the lean startup way and create your hypothesis first and validate it? Or use a user centric approach, like asking questions deriving problems and then building the product around this problems?
 

CarrieW

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Thx for your answer! However, I do not believe in some marketing research posts by authors who do not have doneit, but write about it.

Hence, I would be interested in your own experience and YOUR process!

I appreciate your answer!
I use google for everything. I have searched everything. starting with how to do market research. and I am not being sarcastic. I had to find resources for everything. its all in asking the right questions. unless your researching the feminine hygiene industry MY PROCESS will not help you :)
 
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CarrieW

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@all Thx for your answer!

Do you create the product first or after the market research? So do you do it kind of the lean startup way and create your hypothesis first and validate it? Or use a user centric approach, like asking questions deriving problems and then building the product around this problems?
I had an idea first. and then did research to attempt to validate it which led to more questions and so on...
 

pickeringmt

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Its more like a conversation - you cant do it all yourself up front

do
learn
repeat
 

Mattie

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lol how does he know where I've been, or who I know, or what I've experienced. Easy to judge! lol
 
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Andy Black

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pickeringmt

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why hello there Ian. Just joined the forum to help out with branding but didn't know you were here.
I am a little confused......
But welcome to the forum
 
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CarrieW

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lol stalker :) just kidding. he must know you irl.?.
 

pickeringmt

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Ian it is Matt Ward, Business and Bootstrapping. I need to put a picture on here.
OHHHHHHHHHHH, now is see the picture!

Great to see you here man, you will get a ton out of this forum
 
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AbiH

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Yeah buddy, this will vary a bit from product to product but it is pretty simple to get started.

When I start out, I just brainstorm a list of all of the relevant defining factors for my business and product, things like:
  • who is the target/ideal customer
  • how is their website
  • how is their SM, and what channels do they use
  • packaging
  • pricing
  • fulfillment
  • cart
  • reviews
  • voice (brand)
  • and a good ol' fashioned SWOT
This should be a good place to start. Put these in a spreadsheet, as columns. Then, search around your niche for 5-10 of your top competitors and build them in as rows.

Now just go through and fill it in. I am sure that you will come across more metrics that you will want to add columns for which will be niche specific.

This should get you started, good luck man!

BONUS: when you visit these sites, pay attention to ads you get from these brands after (via re-targeting). This will give you an idea of both:
A- what kinds of ads the competition is using
B- where they are using them
This information is so helpful!!! Thanks!
 

AbiH

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Yeah buddy, this will vary a bit from product to product but it is pretty simple to get started.

When I start out, I just brainstorm a list of all of the relevant defining factors for my business and product, things like:
  • who is the target/ideal customer
  • how is their website
  • how is their SM, and what channels do they use
  • packaging
  • pricing
  • fulfillment
  • cart
  • reviews
  • voice (brand)
  • and a good ol' fashioned SWOT
This should be a good place to start. Put these in a spreadsheet, as columns. Then, search around your niche for 5-10 of your top competitors and build them in as rows.

Now just go through and fill it in. I am sure that you will come across more metrics that you will want to add columns for which will be niche specific.

This should get you started, good luck man!

BONUS: when you visit these sites, pay attention to ads you get from these brands after (via re-targeting). This will give you an idea of both:
A- what kinds of ads the competition is using
B- where they are using them

Sorry, what do you mean by Cart and SWOT?

Cheers!
 

ZF Lee

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Sorry, what do you mean by Cart and SWOT?

Cheers!
I think by cart, it means whether the actual purchasing step works smoothly.

I've had a few buy pages give up on me before, as it was either too buggy, slow or crowded.
Or didn't have a wide range of payment options (credit card, Paypal, etc)
And that meant I didn't buy from there.

Make sure it's easy for people to buy from you.

For SWOT, it's a basic analytic process of earmarking Strength, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats of the business idea.

Mind though that there's many ways to classify them, so it can be very subjective, even if you try to allocate scores.
 
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Marty-WOB

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Another thing that comes to mind is Google Trends. It can help you determine the search volume in a certain time frame and also which countries are searching for your keywords.
It's also useful to determine if a product has seasonal demand (for example christmas or summer).
 

Kevin88660

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Hello guys,

I am an extremely structured person. However, I have been much more on the product development site of things and really have no experience with market research/competitor analysis. Therefore I was wondering, how do you do that?

What`s your market research/competitor analysis process?

I appreciate your answer!
Talk to people in the business.
 

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